Tourists crowd at Mount Huangshan on the third day of Chinese Lunar New Year on Jan. 30, 2017 in Huangshan, Anhui Province. China’s aging population will largely increase in 10 years’ time. (Photo : Getty Images)
China need not worry about a demographic crisis, according to a major Chinese official, and such assertion comes after a projected population of 1.45 billion by 2030, reported the Global Times.
“China doesn’t lack in population,” said Wang Peian, National Health and Family Planning Commission’s deputy director, during a press briefing in Beijing on March 11.
“Not in 100 years.”
Worries over a likely population crisis stem out from the fact that as China’s population will significantly increase in the coming years, so is the number of its people aged 60 and above.
By 2020, according to China News Service, senior citizens will comprise 17.8 percent--or an estimated 255 million--of the country’s total population.
Considering that staggering figure, China’s labor force seems to face an imminent decline.
Wang, however, dismissed concerns over a potential shortage of manpower.
He said that the country will utilize technological advancements to counteract any drop in the labor force.
He also said that despite having a lower working age population--some 730 million versus China’s 1 billion--Europe and the U.S. enjoy “a much higher productivity rate.”
The working-age population of China, similar to many other countries, consists of those aged between 15 and 64.
The retirement age in the country for men and women are 60 and 50, respectively.
China’s labor force will register at 985 million in 2020.
Even by 2025, according to Wang, China may not experience a labor shortage, with its working-age population to likely reach 800 million.
When the government lifted its one-child policy in 2015, with the two-child policy taking effect on Jan. 1, 2016, the country welcomed more than 18 million babies last year.
Wang said, quoted Xinhua, that they were “very optimistic” about the effect of the two-child policy.
China’s population registered at 1.37 billion in 2015.
